Date with the Devil
by clay12345
Summary: All about Lucy and Amy's relationship post-Endgame with the twist that Amy doesn't leave DEBS. The first chapter is something of a prologue.
1. Lyin' Eyes

**Chapter 1**

**Lyin' Eyes  
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_ watch?v=5-NlR54PqLw_**  
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_"People think that a liar gains a victory over his victim. What I've learned is that a lie is an act of self-abdication, because one surrenders one's reality to the person to whom one lies, making that person one's master, condemning oneself from then on to faking the sort of reality that person's view requires to be faked... The man who lies to the world, is the world's slave from then on... There are no white lies, there is only the blackest of destruction, and a while lie is the blackest of all."  
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_- Ayn Rand (Atlas Shrugged)  
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**i don't claim to own any of this. title song is by the eagles. the link is to the song.**

The blond girl leaned forward, pressing herself up on the counter, her lips parting ever so slightly as she pushed forward a slip of paper. The bank teller felt as though his eyes were going to bulge out of their sockets; he couldn't take his gaze off of her. Her fingers danced across the space between the two, and slowly, ever so slowly, she began to chew on her bottom lip, moving her own eyes across the bank teller's figure, as though to size him up herself.

"I would… really appreciate it if you could help me out here… sir."

She made certain to add extra emphasis to that last and final word, sprinkling a shot of sultriness over the syllable, a huskiness that made the man gulp and clear his throat. The blond allowed another smile to grace her lips; "Yes… It would mean so much to me…" She lifted her finger up from the slip of paper she had been fiddling with to the man's collar, hooking the tip between the fabric and the skin of his neck, loosening the tightly buttoned up shirt. "I would be… how should I say it? Indebted to you?"

"Ah… Well I love to be of service," he mumbled, cursing himself as his voice cracked. "Tell me what you need."

The finger unhooked from the bank teller's collar and slid back to the piece of paper, making a point of sliding it towards him dramatically. Her other hand slid down her leg, steady and poised to get the job done. She smiled as she used her finger to slowly rotate the note, allowing the bank teller to read its contents upright.

The man who had been, up to that point, pink and sweaty with arousal began to pale considerable. The air around him suddenly dropped a few degrees fahrenheit. He inwardly began to shiver and gulped, a second time, albeit for a very, very different reason. He looked up at the face that had been trying to, as he saw it, seduce him. He blinked as a bead of sweat began to gather on the ridge of his eyebrow, threatening to drip over his right eye. His gaze momentarily flickered downwards.

"Uh uh uh," tutted the blonde, shaking her head as she smiled. "No sudden movements, okay?"

The bank teller slowly nodded his head as a small short squeal escaped his throat. He had never been too good with eye contact before, but now, he couldn't rip himself from the staring game he was playing with the barrel of a chromed 9mm pistol, the smooth black silencer screwed neatly and tightly on.

"Now my friend here," said the blonde, motioning to her associate behind her, "is going to need access to your biggest, shiniest vault, so what you're going to do is do your thing on that computer thing over there and unlock it." She smiled as she shifted the barrel of the gun closer to the man's head. "And no funny business. Don't think I can't see what you're doing there."

He nodded. So maybe he couldn't call for help. What he could do was stall, right? Until the authorities guessed that something was up? He could just tell them that the computer systems were incredibly slow, which really wasn't such a stretch of a lie…

"No stalling either," she said, an amused smile spreading across her face. "We already took care of the security systems and emptying this place while… you were distracted. I think you really should start paying attention to what's going on around you. Anyhow, no one's coming anytime soon. We could just break into that vault ourselves, but you see, my friend and I are kind of in a funk today. We don't really feel like doing any more work then necessary. So why don't you be a good boy and do this one… little… teensy… thing for me?"

The man clicked a button on the keyboard and a large "chunk" reverberated through the floor from the basement level of the bank. The blond nodded her associate to the direction of the staircase.

"Good boy," she smiled. She cocked the gun, pulling back the slide. "Now while my friend is off and away, we're just going to have to sit tight here, okay?" She pressed the gun against the bank teller's forehead. "But that doesn't mean you should try playing hero, alright?"

The man nodded vigorously in fear, and the blond felt a surge of adrenaline pulse through her veins. For a split second, she allowed her muscles to relax, the thrill rippling through her body. The blond frowned, a contemplative expression pinching her brow. It all seemed like such a whirl, such a frenzy of pain and elation, heartbreak and joy, that sometimes, when she thought about it, she could barely breathe or comprehend that the memories coursing through her head were, indeed, hers. Of course, not a day went by where she wasn't able to remember every little detail of every single day that passed through that flurry of emotion that eventually had gotten her to that strange and implausible position, standing before an innocent hardworking man, her gun pressed to his head as she robbed the establishment of every last penny. No. There was no way she could forget any of it even if she tried.

She remembered everything.

XXX

For a master criminal, Lucy Diamond was an awful liar. As far as Amy could tell anyway. She watched as the other girl quickly attempted to change her expression… her tone of voice… in an attempt to save face. Amy couldn't help but feel a little something in her chest tug at the sight of Lucy attempting to cover up the hurt.

"I just don't want you to get the wrong idea," Amy had said.

Lucy's face had fallen at those words, even if ever so slightly; "yeah… uh, okay."

"I mean, I really like you."

"Right…"

"But I don't… like _like_ you…"

It had been visible, at that point, more so than before. It had been in the way Lucy had looked down… in the way her eyes had flitted away… in the way her smile (the one that Amy, in truth, loved) had slowly faded away, disappearing.

And that's when she had tried to save face. That's when she had tried to lie, tried to reassert her persona as the Lucy Diamond, the notorious master criminal, head of the Reynolds Syndicate. Cocky. Confident. She lied. For Amy's sake, of course. The only problem was the nagging thought in Amy's head that her newfound acquaintance really was an awful liar.

"Yeah!" Lucy said. "Yeah… I gathered. That's… that's why I brought you here, so we could… you know… sort of clear the air between us."

"I mean it's really sweet of you to go through all this trouble to… shoot and all. But…" And there it was again. The flash of Lucy Diamond's vulnerable side, the side of Lucy that Amy had never before really comprehended the other girl to possess.

"My friends are gonna wonder where I am," Amy finished.

"No they're not," Lucy replied, suddenly feeling back in her element.

"Why?"

"No reason," she said, flashing the other girl a smile.

"Lucy!" Amy yelled, realizing, then, what was occurring above their heads. "Oh my god, Lucy!"

"Oh c'mon! It's not like they're gonna die or anything."

"Let them out; I'm serious."

"Okay," Lucy relented, finally, pushing the buttons on her handheld. "Jesus. Booby trap deactivated. Happy?"

"That wasn't funny."

Lucy straightened her head, another trademark smile spreading across her face; "It was kinda funny."

And then there was a moment. A moment when the two of them realized that they had let it all fall away, entering a world where none of the complications really mattered or even existed at all. It didn't matter that Lucy was a girl, or on every federal agency's most wanted list, and it didn't matter that Amy was DEB. None of it mattered. It was only Lucy and Amy. Well, it was Lucy and Amy and Lucy's "little" prank. The tension had, in an instant, fallen to the floor.

"I can't do this," Amy whispered, reality sinking in. She looked up; "I gotta go."

"No! No." Lucy stopped Amy in her tracks. "I'll... go."

Every one of Lucy Diamond's smiles meant something different. Every one of Lucy Diamond's smiles spoke miles of phrases and words, conveying everything the girl felt and needed to say.

And this one… this one had never really before graced Lucy Diamond's face. Amy couldn't believe her eyes. Neither could she wish away the ache that spread through her like a fever upon seeing the hurt and disappointment in Lucy's smile.

"Look," she said. "I understand that this whole thing is going to work out between us, because obviously I misinterpreted the whole situation but…" Lucy paused, trying to find the right parting words to give to the girl she was convinced she could have fallen in love with. "I just want you to know that last night was the most alive I've felt in a while. So… I guess I'll see around. Same… bad time or whatever…"

And there it was again. The smile.

That's when Amy grabbed her. That's when she realized she couldn't take it, to see that particular smile.

They kissed. And it had been as simple as that, but it had spoken more words than they ever could have expressed at that moment.

They pulled apart and Lucy, smiling now, said the only three words that mattered; "Come with me."

When the other DEBs arrived one scene, they would find the graffiti splayed across the concrete wall. They would panic. Janet would be annoyed. Max would be devastated, the day's earlier events and quarrels flashing through her mind. But in truth, in truth, Amy was happy. She felt, in that moment, more like herself than she ever had before, and she couldn't stop the intense feeling of absolute joy at seeing that smile of hurt replaced with one of happiness. It felt like a drug had been sent coursing through her system, filling her throat and shooting tingles through her fingertips.

Amy Bradshaw was falling in love.

By the seventh day, the two girls had shared more with each other than they ever thought was possible to do. The sensation of their bodies pressed together, Lucy's hands in Amy's pockets, Amy's figure curled into Lucy's embrace, as they watched the sunrise, was impossible to forget. The sensation of happiness was impossible to forget.

Lucy straddled Amy as they wrestled.

"Do you give?" she said, laughing. "Do you give?" she said again.

"No!" Amy cried out, determined not to be beaten out by Lucy Diamond.

"Do you love me?"

Amy looked into her eyes. Everything else faded away.

"Yes," she breathed.

In that moment, that was all that had mattered.

XXX

Ms. Petrie couldn't believe her ears. Amy Bradshaw in bed with Lucy Diamond? Really? This must be a dream. Of course this is a dream. In what reality does this possibly make sense? In what reality would Amy Bradshaw, the Perfect Score, have sex with Lucy Diamond, most wanted? Hadn't they taught against this in one of those damn classes? Well, it had been too good to be true, hadn't it? The one of her own DEBs had fought Lucy Diamond and lived to tell the tale. There was no tale to tell. This whole thing had gone to shit!

But that girl. What was her name? Margaret? Alex? No. Max. That one had come up with the perfect solution. She would have to remember this later. That Max has some good sense. Genius is what it is… naming Amy DEB of the year… making the girl give that speech. After all, Amy is the Perfect Score. If anything, it's good that Amy had been the one fall for Lucy Diamond's charms. Amy would be the only one able enough to pull off this sort of lie and cover up.

Amy frowned as Ms. Petrie teleported out of the house. Her frowned deepened, as, one by one, everyone she had considered even marginally a friend, walked out on her. To be fair, that's what she had done to them, right? What stupid luck.

Every inch of the self-doubt that had inhabited Amy before her "abduction" returned, filling her to the core. She had done this. She had caused this hurt. She, Amy Bradshaw, had betrayed her family. They were right. Max was right. They had learned this in class. The unit, above all, meant everything. The unit was the very fabric of every mission's success and therefore the fabric of the foundation of America's security. And she had put all of that in jeopardy.

_I'll do it_, she whispered to herself. _I'll do what they need me to do. I'll go to Endgame with Bobby. I'll recite that stupid speech. I'll…_ Amy choked up as the thoughts crossed her mind. _I'll never see Lucy Diamond again._

She became a robot. Going through the motions but never feeling them.

They had talked about this in class. How this happened to some people and how this phenomenon, this emotionless, made people better spies.

And they had gobbled it all up, perceiving it to be some sort of holy state of spy nirvana.

Wrong. They were all wrong.

It almost all went to shit when Lucy showed up in her room, much like that first night.

"It's kinda this little game we play," she had said.

But Amy shook her head, hoping with every inch of her body that Lucy wouldn't truly believe the words that were about to flow out of her mouth.

"Get out."

Lucy protested.

"I said, get out. I'm warning you."

"Amy…"

She could feel it in her head. The tears. The sobs. The distant hope that Lucy wouldn't believe this whole facade, that Lucy would know her better than to do that. Amy's faced revealed none of that. None of that at all. Perfect Score. She pressed the big, red button and the alarms sounded throughout the house.

"You need to leave," she said. Her voice was steadier than she imagined. In her head, it quivered. Shook. Trembled.

The rest of her squad flew into her room, unleashing a stream of bullets and shotgun pellets.

Amy felt her world fall apart, dissolve into pieces around her. No… Please… Not Lucy…

Her vision began to tunnel as she imagined a world without Lucy Diamond's infamous smile. It was almost too much to bear.

She released the breath she had been holding, when Max told her that the two DEB agents had missed their mark. She forced them out of the room, letting them believe that she was in a state of shock upon seeing her Stockholm Syndrome inducing ex-kidnapper. Allowing them to believe that.

That night, Amy let her face break apart.

She cried.

Finally, Amy knew. She knew what the secret test within the SATs tested. It tested her ability to lie, didn't it? Of course, it did. This was the one thing Amy knew how to do better than any other DEB she knew. She was the perfect liar, and as far as she knew or cared, all she seemed able to do was hurt and deceive people. She had already done it to Max, Janet, and Dominique. And now she had done it to Lucy, too. Her pledge to sell this lie, this awful lie, suddenly reaffirmed itself in Amy's mind. Let this be a clean break. Lucy Diamond is Lucy Diamond. She'll find someone new. Someone to make her smile like there's no other care in the world. Someone to make that smile of hurt disappear.

_It just can't be me,_ Amy thought miserably. _All I'll do is hurt her. This is for the better. For Lucy. _

Amy couldn't help but smile upon seeing the balloons explode out of what they now knew to be a fake bomb. She couldn't help but feel her heart flutter as she watched news report after news report, all revealing that the notorious Lucy Diamond had mysteriously taken on a change of heart, returning millions in cash and stolen goods. She couldn't help but want to leave it all behind when seeing the Lucy Diamond signal flash across the sky… signaling to her… asking her to come back. Come home? Come home.

She let the idea flit across her mind. Lucy still loved her. Lucy still cared. After everything.

And then it all stopped. It all came to an end. The cheesy escapades stopped. The news reports stopped. The lights across the sky stopped. The hope that Amy secretly harbored from herself stopped.

She remembered again. It's for the best.

XXX

"Courage. Courage is a big word. I did not know what courage meant to me until i endured seven agonizing days in… captivity."

Amy wanted to throw up. The image of Lucy teaching her how to drive flashed through her mind. The image of the accidental explosion flew before her eyes. The feeling of the two of them, laughing, together, filled her heart.

"Captured and held hostage… by a madwoman."

The words were harder to say than she imagined.

"it was a routine mission gone terribly wrong."

She imagined herself and Lucy, sipping on that oversized smoothie, how it could've tasted like raw meat and it still would have been delicious; it still wouldn't have mattered. She'd never be able to have a smoothie again. Everything tasted like dust now. Everything felt like dust against her skin. Everything reminded her of Lucy.

"I was separated from my squad and knocked unconscious. I awoke in the arms of the enemy."

They had kissed, and it had felt right, more right than anything Amy had done before. She had always known something had been missing, but with Lucy… she had been positive that she had found that missing piece. She had lost herself in Lucy's embrace. And she had left a piece of herself there. That was the truth. Those were the words she wanted falling from her tongue. Her head spun as she heard her voice recite a different set of phrases and syllables.

"…Just the sound of my own desperate thoughts to keep me company."

Deep breath.

"If there is corruption in this city, Lucy Diamond is behind it."

She wished Lucy were here now. To hold her and tell her that it was all going to be okay. That she knew that none of these words were the truth. That she knew that she was being forced to lie. Her wishes fell on empty ears. They always did.

"If there is indecency to be found, she is the root."

Wrong… Wrong!

"If there is evil in this world, it's name is Lucy Diamond."

Everything in her very core struggled against the bobbing of her voice box, the vibrations of her throat, the movements of her tongue and lips. Everything begged her to stop. Begged…

"Uh, it's not until moments like this when one is forced to take stock of oneself…"

She felt the tears build in her eyes, her lids shaking with the need to blink. She wouldn't. She couldn't. The tears began to fall anyway, streaming down her cheeks, running down the side of her nose.

"I'm - I'm sorry," she said, sobs filling her throat. "I can't… c-can't finish this s-speech."

And then she ran, her hand plastered against her mouth in an attempt to hold the sobs in. She brushed by Max, and she could hear her, Ms. Petrie, already on the podium.

"I'm afraid it's been a very trying ordeal for Ms. Bradshaw. But know, Amy, we are proud of you. Ms. Max Brewer, Amy's squad captain, will receive Amy's award on her behalf. Ms. Brewer?"

XXX

Lucy pressed her head against the hood of her steering wheel, the events playing out again in her mind.

"…Just the sound of my own desperate thoughts to keep me company."

That's when she had run in. God, Amy was… beautiful in that dress. She's always… beautiful.

"If there is corruption in this city, Lucy Diamond is behind it."

She had felt her face fall. Amy?

"If there is indecency to be found, she is the root."

Amy? Everything had begun to blur. Amy? Amy?

"If there is evil in this world, it's name is Lucy Diamond."

Lucy had looked down, from the balcony, at Amy. Amy couldn't see her, but still, she had flashed her one last smile, flashed her a smile that spoke a million words.

She had brushed past Bobby, ignoring his existence, ignoring everything.

She never could cry, but in that moment, Lucy Diamond had allowed a single tear to tell the tale

**To be continued...**


	2. Home

**Chapter 2**

**Home  
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_ watch?v=-8P6U_80r7Y&feature=related_

_"Why are we here, that is the question. And we are blessed in this, that we happen to know the answer. Yes, in this immense confusion one thing alone is clear. We are waiting for Godot to come."  
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_- Samuel Beckett (Waiting for Godot)  
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**i don't own any of this. the title song is by mumford & sons. the link is to the song.**

* * *

Six months. Six. Months.

She didn't know the exact length of time since she had walked away from Endgame. Hell, she didn't even know how many weeks it had been since the start of the month, let alone what the date was. Sunday? Tuesday? Maybe Thursday. No way to tell. No way at all. She poured more alcohol down her throat and let it burn. She didn't even know what she was drinking. Her mind didn't really work the way it. Nothing worked the way it used to. Damn you, Amy. Damn you. She took in more of the liquid, breathing the tingling vapor in and out, letting it fill her mouth, kiss the insides of her throat.

She didn't even know had she had gotten to that place where she now stood. Had it really been so long ago? So long ago since her and Amy had spent that short seven days together? So long ago since the two of them had

She didn't want to remember anymore.

Lucy Diamond was tired.

So tired.

The sun glowed in the distance, and a part of her decided to wonder, wonder what it would be like if Amy were still here, if Amy chose to stay with her, if Amy really, in this moment, so many months ago, had really felt anything at all.

Amy Bradshaw was the Perfect Score, after all. The perfect liar.

That didn't mean she wanted to believe it.

"I miss you," she choked out, looking out at the setting sun, her eyes following the silhouette of the disappearing light.

XXX

Lucy Diamond liked to break people. Not kill. Break.

It made her more ruthless than her criminal counterparts; she was willing to do what others wouldn't even dream of thinking. Killing is the shortcut. Killing leads to unnecessary complications. Killing is too personal. No. Breaking people was the Lucy Diamond motus operandi. There was an elegance to it, a delicacy. After all, she wasn't some sort of gun toting gang banger. In her circles, crime is business: nothing more, nothing less. And if someone didn't uphold their end of the contract? There had to be hell to pay. There had to be a consequence. And people oftentimes seemed much more open to being killed than having their lives ripped apart at the seams. It was always easier to die. Yes. When Lucy Diamond broke people, she struck fear in the hearts of men.

He was forty-five years old and bald. Sweat stuck to his skin like glue. He smelled like formaldehyde and eucalyptus cough drops.

He ran a drug trafficking ring in Compton, all the while sitting in his posh mansion in goddamn Beverly Hills. He was the spider, his network of drug dealing lowlives touching every corner of the city. He knew everything. He even enlisted children, roping them in with so called high-end cocaine and heroin. Selling narcotics to kids, Vincent Glass wasn't exactly at the top of the most ethical men of the year list.

Two months earlier, he had made a deal with Lucy Diamond. Give her the names of the scumbags who carried out a hit on one of her lieutenants, and she would remove the shipping roadblocks on his… little business. Scratch my back, and I'll scratch yours. Except he lied. Another one of her lieutenants walked into a trap and came out in a body bag, wheeled away on a stretcher.

Suddenly Vincent Glass found himself sitting in a barely livable one bedroom apartment smack dab in the middle of Compton, watching his beloved empire crumble at the hands of his own coke-snorting kids.

It hadn't been too hard, to get the eldest daughter hooked. All it took was some mysterious older man to peer pressure her into it and fill her with an insatiable hatred of her father.

Yes, Vincent Glass was alive, but he had nothing.

And then there was Barbara Miller. She smelled faintly of lilies and sported a thick dark color across her lips. She was not bald.

Barbara Miller was a mole. A Benedict Arnold who gained the trust of everyone in the Reynolds family. They had trusted her with some of the high tech security systems, eventually, in a sense, adopting her as one of their own.

One morning it was discovered that there had been a breach. Barbara Miller was gone… along with thirteen million dollars worth of paintings.

Suffice to say, Lucy Diamond was not happy.

It wasn't a difficult thing, to find Barbara Miller. Thirteen million dollars worth of paintings don't just fall off the grid, and the gang of men Ms. Miller had decided to sell away her adoptive family for were nowhere near top notch. They were incompetent and not at all a match for Lucy Diamond.

It had been a quick operation. There weren't many of them. One woke up the next morning, dazed and confused in a cold room in Siberia. Another woke up in an insane asylum in New Mexico. The third and the fourth found themselves in Sudan and North Korea respectively. The fifth had the unfortunate misfortune of waking in the custody of a Japanese brothel. Of course, they left Barbara Miller woke up exactly where she had fallen asleep the night before. In the warehouse. Empty. Her name blacklisted. Alone.

Too bad for Barbara Miller.

Disloyalty's a bitch.

Above all, she liked to tell the story of the dirty cop who thought he could double cross the Lucy Diamond and the Reynolds Syndicate. What a funny man.

Detective Gordon didn't have much going for him. His pension had been shaved down to the ground. Internal Affairs had begun to catch wind of some of the detective's more… questionable affairs. But he did have one thing that made his life, above others, marginally enviable. His fiancee was easily one of the most beautiful women in Los Angeles. She was the sort that could waltz right out of bed, walk outside, and still appear to be absolutely stunning. She didn't need make-up and hell, she didn't even need nice clothes. And boy, Detective Gordon was by no means a genius, but he knew more than anyone else how well he had done in this one particular portion of his life. He loved her. With all his puny little heart.

He believed himself to be a clever man, infiltrating the Reynolds Syndicate, syphoning off small shavings of intel. He spread himself between three different families and the LAPD. Double agent? Triple agent? Is there even a word for what that is?

The truth was, when it came to Detective Gordon, became grossly twisted.

And Lucy Diamond, once made aware of Detective Gordon's questionable loyalties, was far from pleased.

She had a reputation to uphold.

Not, Detective Gordon was not an intelligent man. In fact, he did not even seen her face and hadn't the slightest idea of what she actually looked like. This, of course, made it all the more easier for her to step right into the heart of his life. Amber, she called herself. Amber Clyde.

It began with a few touches here and there. Grazes. Strokes. Lucy could almost smell the lust for her emanating off of the fiancee's skin.

A kiss was all it took, and easy access to the Gordon household fell firmly in her hands.

She would ring the doorbell when the detective was out and about, and the fiancee would let her in. She would lay her on the bed and kiss her, whisper sweet nothings and hand her pleasure she had never known before. And when the fiancee had finally been lulled to a sleep, she would walk right into Detective Gordon's little man cave, that room he kept to himself and only to himself. At first, she only moved things. Switched a few items here and there, beginning is fall into insanity. Eventually, of course, she upgraded. Every afternoon, after every fuck, she'd leave a little mouse to scurry across the room. The room became exponentially filled with vermin. Of course, she was Lucy Diamond, and these were Lucy Diamond's mice. Specially trained. Specially trained for this particular operation.

The mice never left that little room.

"Mice! M-mice everywhere," he had yelled, the insanity beginning to edge across his voice. "They're… They're e-everywhere! I c-can't make th-them go a-away!"

"Mice?" replied the fiancee. "What are you talking about? There aren't any mice?"

Lucy had smiled slowly chewing a piece of gum.

Eventually the good detective returned home early and called Animal Control. But with a push of a button on Lucy's little device, the mice were gone in an instant, scattered across the neighborhood. Animal Control walked in on an empty room.

"Sir, uh, there aren't any mice here."

Of course, that's when he chose to walk into his bedroom; his eyes bulged as he watched another woman have her way with his fiancee.

"Get out!" he screamed.

And so she did, slipping her pants back on. As she passed, she moved her lips towards his ear, whispering something that he knew only Lucy Diamond would say.

He ran around after that, desperately claiming that there indeed had been a pack of mice living out in his empty man cave and that his wife had been having sex with _the _Lucy Diamond.

Eventually LAPD found a reason to let Detective Gordon go.

They sent him to the psych ward.

Yes, Lucy Diamond had always liked to break people. It was simply an alternative to killing, a way to strike fear, a way to appear ruthless in a largely male dominated world. It was a way, in other words, to do business.

XXX

She dropped the bottle ahead of her, watching as it softly fell on the sand with a soft thud. Slowly she put a foot down on the first rung of the ladder, attempting to lower herself from the road to the beach. She could remember helping Amy down this same ladder, not that Amy needed any help. Lucy had, in that instant, felt the insatiable desire to give in to the rules of chivalry and lend the DEB agent a helping hand. Amy had understood, accepting the aid without much thought. Lucy smiled softly, the memories swirling over her eyes.

The lump came back, plaguing her throat as the stone of recognition began to sink in her stomach.

_Amy's not here anymore. Amy's not coming back. Because of what you do. Because of what you are. _She laughed to herself bitterly. _If there is corruption in the city, Lucy Diamond is behind it._

She began to tremble when the tear slid down her cheek. She tried to step down again, clinging to the rough, browning metal as well as she could. Step. Step Step. Three points of contact. C'mon. Keep it.

_If there is indecency to be found, Lucy Diamond is the root._

A dry sob erupted from the back of her throat. _It's true. She's right. She's not lying because it's true. _She forced a sputtered cough, desperately trying to get that tightening knot out from her chest. Step. Step. Her head swayed back and forth as she lowered herself down the ladder. Her head felt light and beyond her control.

_If there is evil in this world, it's name is Lucy Diamond._

Step. No. No step. Lucy felt herself fall backwards as her foot missed the next rung of the ladder, her already weak grip quickly loosening. She landed with a thud on the sand, the bottle beside her face. The bruise on her shin began to throb from hitting one of the rungs on the way down. It throbbed and throbbed and throbbed. But she didn't feel it. She couldn't feel it. She hadn't felt that sort of pain in a long time.

Six months was it?

She looked up at the California sky, pouring more alcohol into her mouth, ignoring the way it dribbled down the side of her face and over her neck. The night air had settled across the state, and from where she lay, she could make it a dim cluster of stars. It was the only place near or around Los Angeles where you could see this many stars. This was her mountain top, her hermit's cove. It was the one place in the world where she could be at peace. And she had shared this place with Amy. She felt compelled to. It seemed like such a good idea at the time. Leave in the afternoon with some food and a tent. Camp out here for the night. Watch the sunrise in the morning. It had been perfect. But now…

Now…

Now she had lost everything. She had lost the love of her life and her little secret "hermit's cove" to boot.

She had nothing.

Because everything, absolutely everything, reminded her of Amy.

A year ago, this place would have immediately calmed her, sent her into a peaceful state of being. Now she saw ghosts of Amy in every corner of the space, in every inch.

It sent her spiraling into chaotic turmoil.

XXX

And then there was Bruce. Bruce Davis.

Mr. Davis was a regular joe. A construction worker in downtown Los Angeles, smack dab in the middle of Reynolds turf. Normally, a hardworking construction man like Bruce would get immunity from the Reynolds Syndicate. They would, for all intents and purposes, cover for that sort of blue collar citizen. Crime is business after all. Nothing more, nothing less.

But when the hardworking construction man falls in love with the daughter of a rivaling Los Angeles crime family, leading to the deaths of more than a handful of Reynolds operatives, there can never exist the possibility that Lucy Diamond sit by and do nothing. Despite the nice little West Side Story love plot the man had going on, it didn't change the fact that he, Bruce Davis, was responsible for more than a few deaths of some very important people.

So she set about her plan of breaking the man.

Of making an example of him.

That no one, absolutely no one, no matter who they are, can get away with hurting a member of Lucy Diamond's family. Loyalty trumps all.

He had discovered that something was up, that Lucy Diamond was coming after him. He knew what was coming. He wasn't an idiot; he knew what Lucy Diamond would and could do.

So he took his girl and fled. To Australia.

And there they made a life for themselves. An honest living away from the shade cast by crime. But the world has gotten much smaller in the years past; word got out that Bruce Davis and Michelle Shauffer had left the country for the Southern Hemisphere. The Great Outback. And Lucy, Lucy no longer had a choice.

She went after them.

The plan was simple enough.

The two clearly meant everything to each other.

Separate them.

All it took was some simple blackmailing, a threat on Bruce Davis' life, and Michelle Shauffer was gone, supposedly without a trace.

Lucy stayed in Australia longer than expected. She watched as the man grew thinner and paler as he sat on the bench of the only train station in the small town. She watched her handiwork come into fruition. She watched as the dwindling Bruce Davis muttered the same things over and over to himself; "I'll wait. I'll wait, I will. I promise. If this is what it takes, I'll do it. I'll wait for you, for as long as you need me to. Every day. I'll be here. Just in case you come home. I promise… Baby, I promise…"

There were moments when she came so close to throwing it all to shit. It wasn't his fault after all. She could tell him. She could bring her back for him. She could bring this to an end.

And then she got the report from Scud.

The Australian government made the decision for her. It wasn't hard news to hide that _the _Lucy Diamond was coming after Bruce Davis and Michelle Shauffer. It wasn't meant to be, and it therefore hadn't been rocket science for the Australian federal services to discover that Michelle Shauffer, a woman with a long rap sheet of her own, had indeed gone 'soft' and fled to Australia. And when Lucy sent the woman to Sydney… She handed the heartbroken woman right into federal hands. She watched footage of the whole ordeal. She had to hand it to the other woman; she refused to back down. She refused to go out without a fight.

They put a bullet in her head.

Lucy swore that she could see the woman mouth those words that were so foreign to her; "I love you, Bruce."

It was no secret in Australia that Michelle Shauffer had died. Everyone knew. It was the law enforcement accomplishment of the decade. The Shauffer family was sent scrambling, left in absolute shambles and ripe for the picking.

Scud demanded that she come home, so as not to endanger herself anymore in the aftermath of the Shauffer death. After all, the Australians must know that Lucy had touched down in country too. But she stayed. She stayed in that small little town in Australia, watching Bruce Davis continue to sit on that same platform bench.

She even approached him, ignoring the fact that people, Davis especially, would recognize her.

Except Davis didn't even offer a flicker of recognition. His eyes were empty, filled with nothing but intense focus, his jaws clenched tight.

"They shot her. She's dead," Lucy said. "She's not coming back."

"I told her I'd wait," he whispered. "I told her I'd wait for her, for as long as she needs me to. I promised."

Lucy walked away, trying to wrap her head around the whole situation. She continued to watch him, mesmerized by his almost monk-like behavior.

The immigration officers arrived only a couple days later. They showed him the papers, that they knew the truth. That his name was Bruce Davis and he was an illegal immigrant from the United States. That they were sorry but they had to deport him.

Hell, if she hadn't been Lucy Diamond, if she hadn't had a reputation to upkeep, she would have stopped them, yelled at them to leave the man alone. But she was Lucy Diamond, and she did have a reputation to upkeep. She watched instead, watched Bruce held on to the bench as if his very life depended on it. She watched as the four burly Australian men managed to pry him away from it anyway. She watched as he screamed in agony, desperately clawing at the air.

"I promised!" he yelled, crying. "I have to wait! I have to! God, I have to!"

And then he was gone.

Two days later, Bruce Davis died in custody.

That's when Lucy tried to sink Australia.

When that failed, she ran away to Iceland.

XXX

Lucy flipped through her memories bitterly. She had done what she had set out to do, hadn't she? She broke the man. That had been the point, right? She tried pulling herself up, instead falling, once more, flat on her back. She found her feet the second time around. She stumbled as she took in another swig of the alcohol.

"I mean, that's just what I do, right?" she yelled, slurring into the darkened sea. "That's just… the kind of person… I am, right?"

The black waves crashed against the sand, the salt spraying into the air as the thunder of the tide trembled through the beach. In that moment, she pretended as though she weren't alone, as though the waves, once bright and sparkling with the sun, now dark, were speaking to her, responding to her. If only she could understand their words.

"And look where i am now! Look at me! I'm just… I'm…" She only cried in single tears and she smirked when she felt that tear fall from her eye once more. "Shit!"

Lucy tried to throw back more of the alcohol, laughing bitterly as she felt it drench the front of her shirt. Her voice fell down into a whisper; "I don't know what's happened to me, but… nothing feels good anymore…"

Lucy Diamond liked to break people.

And diamonds, diamonds _aren't_ supposed to break.

"You broke me," she whispered, shivering with the night. "You broke me, Amy Bradshaw. You broke me."

**to be continued...**


End file.
